Concentrations of 19 perfluorinated compounds in saltwater and freshwater fishes analyzed by liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry

Abstract

Perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) is used for packing materials, surfactant and other materials with a wide range of near our lives. PFCs exist in various environments such as air, water soil and food. Especially, PFCs is mainly detected in water and fish. We analyzed 19 PFCs in fish, living in fresh water or salt water. We collected samples in fish market in Seoul. All fish samples are imported from other countries. After homogenizing samples, 19 PFCs were extracted from the sample using enzyme hydrolysis, ion–pairing extraction and liquid‐liquid extraction. PFCs in the samples were measured by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry. The limit of detection (LOD) of 19 PFCs was ranged from 0.01 to 0.13 ng/g. For the method validation, we validated accuracies and precisions using inter‐day and intra‐day validation. The accuracies were between 80 and 120 % and the precisions were within 20 %. We also analyzed two calibrated concentration of PFCs in the intervals of samples for validating quality control. The average PFCs concentration in fish samples live in fresh water was less than 0.4 ng/g. In fish samples, living in sea water the average of PFCs was less than 0.33 ng/g. The main species of PFCs in freshwater fish and in saltwater fish are PFOA and PFBA, respectively.